The owners of the last traces of Leicester’s Victorian slum housing have said there is support for their plans to demolish them and regenerate the area.

Meesha Group Ltd wants to flatten a block of buildings on the corner of Belgrave Gate and Garden Street and replace it with a complex of shops, flats and warehouses.

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The scheme has, however, proved controversial because the buildings at risk include "one up, one down" homes that, through an oversight, escaped widespread clearance of the city’s 19th century slum housing in 1931.

As previously reported by the Mercury, thousands of people have signed a petition calling for Leicester City Council to reject the scheme.

However, the managing director of Meesha, which bought the site in 2014 intending to expand its nearby print and design works, said the buildings were unsafe and beyond saving.

Raj Patel told the Mercury: “We have had three structural reports saying the buildings are unsafe.

“We secure them but people are still breaking into them. I can’t get insurance for them because they are not safe so if anyone intruding in them gets hurt we will be liable.

"There is also the risk bits could fall off the building into the street.

“It’s in a real state, full of pigeons and rats.”

He said he had collected a counter petition backed by more than 400 people in support of the plans.

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He said: “These are the people in the local area who want us to do this.”

Meesha director Sunny Patel said: “Nobody has lived in these houses for 80 years, nobody has been worried about them or done anything for them.

"Only when we have a proposal to regenerate the area do people want to get involved.

“I have seen people say it should be preserved and kept as a heritage centre or museum.

"Who is going to invest in making that happen? Nobody will.

“We want to create jobs and improve the area.”

City council heritage champion and deputy mayor Adam Clarke and civic society chairman Stuart Bailey are among the supporters of the Save the Slum campaign.

Mr Bailey said the houses were thought to be the last one-up-one-down homes of their era in the city.

He said: “What were slums in 1931 are, due to their rarity, are now part of the city’s heritage 86 years later.”

He said the buildings should be conserved and renovated as part of the regeneration.